Log in to My Virginia.

Civilian Conservation Corps

The Civilian Conservation
Corps (CCC) was the most popular of United States president Franklin Delano
Roosevelt's New Deal programs, even
winning the endorsement of Virginia's conservative U.S. senator Harry Flood Byrd Sr. (While Byrd was
a fellow Democrat, he advocated a small federal government that did not spend ahead
of means or interfere in state affairs.) Designed to alleviate the widespread
unemployment caused by the Great
Depression, the CCC recruited unmarried, unemployed young men between the
ages of eighteen and twenty-five to spend six months in camps doing conservation
work, primarily in the nation's forests. They were paid $1 a day, most of which was
sent to their parents in $25 monthly allotments. The War Department ran most of the
camps on a military basis, providing supervision and discipline. Although some
critics saw a fascist-like militarism in such circumstances, the CCC had the
positive, although unintended consequence of preparing men for service in World War
II (1939–1945). At its peak, the CCC employed half-a-million men in more than 2,500
camps, and 2.5 million men enlisted during its nine-year existence. MORE...

Map This Entry

Share It

The first camp, Camp Roosevelt, was set up at Luray in the George Washington National
Forest in 1933. In its nine years of work, the CCC spent $109 million in Virginia,
the fifth-largest state expenditure in the country. The state ranked fourth in the
number of camps (more than eighty, twelve of which were for black Virginians) and
seventeenth in the total number of enrollees. The CCC employed 107,210 men statewide,
64,762 of whom were Virginia youth and 10,435 of whom were local camp officers and
supervisors. The agency put most of its effort into controlling erosion and flooding
and improving forest landscaping and wildlife conditions. Its contributions in
Virginia were significant: 15.2 million trees planted in reforestation and erosion
control, 986 bridges constructed, fire hazards reduced over 152,000 acres, 2,128
miles of new telephone line strung, and 1.3 million fish stocked. The
conservationists also worked on the restoration of historical sites at Jamestown, Williamsburg, Yorktown, Fredericksburg, and Spotsylvania and combated floods
along the James and Potomac rivers.

The development of a state park system was the most important legacy of the
CCC in Virginia, which before 1933 had had no state parks. Providing labor and
materials, the CCC created a $5 million system that cost Virginia only $100,000—"the
biggest bargain of the New Deal." On June 15, 1936, six state parks—Westmoreland in
Westmoreland County, Seashore (later First Landing State Park) in Princess Anne
County, Fairy Stone in Patrick County, Staunton River in Halifax County, Douthat in
Bath and Alleghany counties, and Hungry Mother in Smyth County west of Marion—were
opened. CCC workers also labored on the federal projects of the Shenandoah National
Park, the Skyline Drive, and the Blue Ridge Parkway.

The war and dwindling unemployment caused the termination of the CCC in 1942. The
final Virginia report summarized its work: "In no State did the CCC make a greater or
more lasting contribution to the well-being of its citizens than it did in
Virginia."

Time Line

April 17, 1933
- The first Civilian Conservation Corps work camp is established in Luray, Virginia.

June 15, 1936
- Virginia's state parks system launches when the six inaugural parks—Douthat, Fairy Stone, Hungry Mother, Seashore, Westmoreland, and Staunton River—open simultaneously. All of the parks are products of the workers employed by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corps.

1942
- The beginning of World War II along with dwindling unemployment cause the termination of of the Civilian Conservation Corps.